EKITI SIEC DISSOLUTION: GROUP WANTS AG, ASSEMBLY CLERK, OTHERS TRIED FOR FORGERY, PERJURY

Coalition of Non Governmental Organisations in Ekiti State, the Ekiti Movement for Peace and Good Governance (MOPEGO) has called for the arrest and trial of the State Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, Mr. Dayo Akinlaja, Clerk of the State House of Assembly, Mr.

Tunde Fagboyegun and others over the presentation false affidavit and forged Curriculum Vitae (CV) of members of the dissolved State Independent Electoral Commission (SIEC) to the Court.

An Ado-Ekiti High Court, today declared the SIEC illegal and ordered that it be dissolved, saying that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), which challenged the composition of the Commission proved that members of the SIEC was supporters of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN).

Reacting to the judgment, MOPEGO said in a statement jointly signed by the Chairman, Dr Tunji Oluwasanmi, Secretary, Comrade Ebenezer Olaleye and Director of Communications and Strategy, Gbenga Babawibe said; “By the judgment, it has been established that the CVs presented to the Court, in which the portion where the SIEC members indicated their membership of ACN was removed was forged. Not only that, it also been established that the affidavit with which the forged CVs were filed to support the government's defence of the suit was false.

“Therefore, the Clerk of the House, who produced the forged CVs and certified them on July 6, 2011, the Attorney General, who presented the forged CVs and the litigation clerk in his office, who deposed to the affidavit in support of the forged Cvs must be made to face the law.”

The PDP had challenged the appointment of five people into SIEC, including the Chairman, Mrs Cecilia Bosede Adelusi, who allegedly claimed in the Curriculum Vitae (CV) she submitted to the State House of Assembly for her screening that she was the Women Leader of ACN in Oye Local Government.

Other were Mr. Remi Olowoloba, who allegedly indicated in his CV that he was a leader of ACN in Igede-Ekiti, Irepodun/Ifelodun Local; Mr Soji Oloketuyi, who has been a member of SIEC before and publicly joined ACN on Wednesday, March 26, 2011 and was reported in The Nation newspaper of the following day and Abduraheem Coker; who was the State Chairman of DPP and also gave evidence as Prosecution Witness 45 in favour of ACN in the election petition filed by the party against the PDP.

However, in its defence, the State government through the Attorney General claimed that that the CVs tendered by the PDP were fake, presenting another sets of CVs that were certified on July 6, 2011, a day before the SIEC members were screened.

Justice Joseph Adeyeye, in his ruling of today upheld the CVs tendered by the PDP as the ones used to screen and confirm the appointment of the SIEC members, and declared the composition of the SIEC improper and unconstitutional.